If your business sells products online, you likely--and rightly--see your website as a sales tool. However, it’s not as likely that you have a nuts-and-bolts understanding of the many overlapping systems that--when optimized--make your website as fine a sales tool as it can be.

For companies that sell physical products online, SEO isn’t just nice to have--it’s essential to the success of their business. But online retailers of all sizes face the same problem: What do you do with a product page when that product is no longer available? According to Matt Cutts, the head of Google’s Webspam team, the answer depends on a few factors, including the number of product pages, your company resources, and the nature of your business.